Yengeni slams Zondo for ‘boosting’ Ramaphosa

Says state capture report ‘is a bid to sway ANC succession battle’

ANC heavyweight Tony Yengeni has launched a virulent attack on chief justice Raymond Zondo, accusing him of openly backing President Cyril Ramaphosa in the run-up to the ANC elective conference in December.

Yengeni, in a complaint to the Judicial Service Commission (JSC), accuses Zondo of having breached the code of judicial conduct in the fourth instalment of his state capture report, which focused, among other things, on attempts during former president Jacob Zuma’s tenure to ensure the National Treasury did the bidding of the Guptas.

Yengeni’s complaint is part of a strategy by Ramaphosa’s opponents within the ANC to try to unseat the president at the elective conference.

In his complaint, Yengeni accuses Zondo of fanning factional fires in the ANC and trying to tilt the scales in Ramaphosa’s favour by singing his “political praises” ahead of the conference, where he is expected to seek a second term.

Yengeni, a member of the ANC’s national working committee, cites Zondo’s remarks in part 4 of his report, submitted at the end of last month, to the effect that Ramaphosa’s election as ANC leader in 2017 saved the Treasury, and by extension the country, from further damage.

Yengeni argues that Zondo’s opinions have no legal basis and the only conclusion to be drawn is that the chief justice was entering the political arena.

He says Zondo was in “gross violation” of the code of judicial conduct, which bars judges from involvement in politics, and his remarks could be “fanning the factional fires” in the ANC and could influence the outcome of the elective conference.

“When a chief justice, no less, says a candidate for the presidency of the ruling party saved the country from ‘more damage’, that political comment carries significant political weight with voting delegates and potential political donors. This is what has moved me to lodge this complaint,” Yengeni says in the complaint, an unsigned copy of which was seen by the Sunday Times.

JSC spokesperson Doris Tshepe confirmed receiving Yengeni’s complaint.

Yengeni, a Zuma supporter, is an ally of Ramaphosa’s political nemesis, Ace Magashule, who has been suspended as the party’s secretary-general due to the corruption charges against him.

Yengeni argues that Zondo made his comments in full knowledge that the ANC would hold its elective conference in December and that calls had been made for Ramaphosa to be re-elected. Zondo was also aware that other candidates might be in the running to challenge the incumbent.

Yengeni says Zondo has “either deliberately or negligently” placed himself in the middle of the ANC’s leadership contest. “He has done so by pronouncing in his report that the election of the current president of the ANC at the December 2017 national conference saved South Africa from ‘further damage’.”

Zondo had overstepped the boundaries. “Firstly, the need for such pronouncement and the pronouncement itself did not form part of the terms of reference of the Zondo commission,” Yengeni says.

“Secondly, a chairperson of a commission of inquiry does not perform the role of a judge. In other words, his/her role is not to render judgment which has legal and binding effect after hearing evidence. His/her role is rather to make recommendations to the president, which the president is free to accept or reject.”

Yengeni takes issue with Zondo’s view that the election of Ramaphosa saved the country. Under Ramaphosa’s leadership unemployment had risen, South Africans faced load-shedding that was costing the country billions, crime was said to have grown worse and there were reports of corruption within his cabinet, he says.

“On these facts, quite how the chief justice reaches the conclusion that the current president saved South Africa from ‘further damage’ is puzzling,” Yengeni writes.

“The conclusion has no factual basis. As the leader of the judiciary, it is not the place of the chief justice to make such pronouncements, least of all during an election year for the ruling ANC. Such pronouncements set the chief justice (and by extension the judiciary) on a collision path with politicians on the political terrain. The chief justice does not belong there.”

Yengeni cites the case in which the JSC ordered Zondo’s predecessor, Mogoeng Mogoeng, to apologise for expressing in public his personal views on SA’s diplomatic relations with Israel.

Yengeni says Zondo’s remarks in the fourth report came a month after he was appointed chief justice.

“This makes me wonder, as an ordinary person, whether this was not one of the conditions for his appointment as new chief justice. I ask the Judicial Conduct Committee to investigate this issue because the overtly political pronouncement of the chief justice seems to me to be wholly out of character for a senior jurist and leader of the judiciary to make.”

When a chief justice, no less, says a candidate for the presidency of the ruling party saved the country from ‘more damage’, that political comment carries significant political weight

Tony Yengeni